Teaching history is at a bit of a crossroads. High school history, particularly with its emphasis on objective forms of testing and standardization, has diluted history and gives the sense that there should be some sort of objective correct answer. Objective testing and a renewed sense of practical applicability to every aspect of education has [...]
Also tagged Education, musings, Students, textbooksIf I were to pick my greatest strength and greatest weakness as a student and an academic, they would be the same: I am utterly self-indulgent when it comes to researching things that interest me and sharing that research with others. This character trait is a strength in that I have diverse interests that only [...]
Also tagged Education, employment, liberal artsI have not been writing on my blog recently. There are a variety of reasons for this, including the demands of graduate school, several alternate places that I write and some issues that I have run into in life, but perhaps the biggest concern for me in regards to the blog is the sense of [...]
Also tagged blog, community, media, Purpose, Thoughts“Let him who cuts individuals out of history but pay close attention and he will perceive that either he has not cut them out at all, as he imagined, or he has cut out with them history itself.” ~Bernadetto Croce (On History 107) One of the problems with history is that it is fundamentally a [...]
Also tagged Education, great man theory, liberal arts, scienceI have always liked museums, and I guess this is still true after a fashion. I like some of the objects which are now only available in museums, and definitely believe that those objects are better off in museums for people to see than in private collections for just the wealthy. The problem is that, [...]
Also tagged Education, horses, museums, native americansOn this day seventy years ago, the National Socialist German Worker’s Party put out an official statement in regards to a well-loved children’s story and song about Christmas, put out just one year previous. It was bad enough that Saint Nick was the patron saint of Moscow, but this song was seen as contrary to [...]
Also tagged Adolph, Nazi Germany, StoriesIn a review of a new book, Carthage Must Die,Christopher Hart was generally hostile. I have not read this book, but the sense of the review was that this is a new history of the Roman-Punic conflicts from the Carthaginian angle. In the strictest sense, the criticism is that this is (I can only assume) [...]
Also tagged Historiography, narrative, reviewThe following thoughts are retransmitted from and the product of a discussion held by Dr. Kurt Raaflaub, emeritus professor from Brown University, at The University of Missouri on the Ulterior Motives of these historians. When the word history is mentioned, there is a certain preconception held, namely that there will follow a discussion of those [...]
Also tagged Historians, Purpose“A single thread in a tapestry though its color brightly shines can never see its purpose in the pattern of the grand design” ~Through Heaven’s Eyes, The Prince of Egypt Even those historians who promote a sweeping narrative generally do so for a small region or group of peoples. At a certain level it is [...]
Also tagged EducationMerriam-Webster Online DictionaryBiography — 1 : a usually written history of a person’s lifeHistory — 1: tale, story 2 a: a chronological record of significant events (as affecting a nation or institution) often including an explanation of their causes What is the first thing that comes to mind when someone says they are reading a [...]
Also tagged Collingwood, Historiography